Again, I am breaking all rules of blogging by stating I literally have not the faintest idea about the status of terrorism in Russia, and my knowledge really is limited to sometimes correctly spelling Chechnyan rebels. As such, I have no comments on the bombing that took place today.
And if you read the comments, I can’t even spell stuff right. Apparently it is Chechen rebels.
Violet
Recent suicide bombers in Russia have been women. Not sure about this one.
I’m somewhat concerned about this because a loved one is transiting through that airport in a week or so.
Kiril
“Chechen” is the adjective. You mean “Chechen rebels.”
General Stuck
@Violet:
Called “Black Widows” because their husbands were killed fighting the Russians.
Pococurante
We don’t either. Let the uninformed opinions flow!
geg6
Kiril is correct, Cole. It’s “Chechen.”
When I first heard that a bomb went off at Moscow’s airport, my first thought was that it was Russian mafia related. But now that they said it was a suicide bomber, it was, no doubt, a Chechen rebel. And most likely a woman. As Stuck points out, they are often widows of Chechen rebels killed by Russia.
The Grand Panjandrum
Here is English language coverage from Russian Television.
Violet
The BBC live text commentary is good. It auto-updates.
fasteddie9318
The Chechens and the Tamil Tigers used to be the R&D arms of international terrorism, and with the Tigers gone I guess that leaves the Chechens. That makes this attack worrisome, in my opinion, because attacking airports rather than airplanes has always struck me as something terrorist groups might consider in terms of maximizing casualties while minimizing security hoops.
bjacques
It could well have been a Black Widow. Checnya is the private fief of Putin’s pet psychopath Ramzan Kadyrov. He’s a former rebel who saw which way the wind was blowing and switched sides in the second Chechen War. Considering he’s widely known to be a Russian puppet, it’s not surprising one of his victims or a survivor decided to take the war back to the puppetmaster.
As is often the case, this amounts to blowing away a lot of civilians whose only crime was being unlucky.
Jack Bauer
Recent militancy in Russia (BBC):
• Oct 2010 – Six people killed as militants storm parliament in Chechnya, North Caucasus
• Mar 2010 – Suicide bombings at two Moscow metro stations kill 40 people; attack blamed on North Caucasus militants
• Nov 2009 – Bomb blast hits Moscow-St Petersburg luxury express train, killing 26; North Caucasus Islamist group claims responsibility
• Sept 2004 – Chechen rebels seize school in Beslan; 334 hostages, including many children, killed in ensuing battle
• Aug 2004 – Suicide bomber blows herself up at a Moscow metro station, killing 10
• Aug 2004 – Two Tupolev airliners that took off from Domodedovo blown up in mid-air by suicide bombers, killing 89 passengers and crew
Amnesty report on Russian action in Chechnya here (pdf).
Violet
@fasteddie9318:
Another excellent and easy target for suicide bombers would be the lines of people waiting to go through security checkpoints. An attack there would throw the entire security structure into disarray.
Comrade Javamanphil
Since we cannot stop crazy people from blowing stuff up if they are willing to lay down their lives to do it, perhaps we would be better off considering ways to make them less interested in sacrificing their own lives. I propose no longer killing their spouses a starting point.
I will now go sit in the
dunceDFHvery unserious person corner.Arclite
In other news, Glenn Beck’s rant against an 80 year old professor about some essay she wrote 40 years ago is resulting in death threats against her. But right-wing rhetoric never results in violence. It’s all just a coincidence.
Jody
John, one of the reasons this is my favorite blog is because you regard “I don’t have enough knowledge of the situation and am withholding an opinion until I get more information” as a valid point of view, and use it.
Dave
@fasteddie9318: This. The attack took place in the arrivals hall, which I would bet is outside the security area much like ours are outside the TSA security points.
It will be interesting to see what security measures are taken now. And how effective they will be in stopping the next attack. My guess is very little…
Culture of Truth
Are they good rebels? – like in 1776 or Star Wars, or are they bad rebels like John Brown, or are they depends-who-you-ask rebels, like Confederates?
stuckinred
@Jack Bauer: Wasn’t there a nasty one in a theater where they had gas?
Mark S.
@fasteddie9318:
And the attack a year ago was on metro stations. IANAT, but that would seem to me to be a pretty damn effective target: virtually no security, extremely crowded during rush hours. I think we’ve been lucky our last couple terrorists have been trying underwear bombs.
Punchy
Do Cheches write checks to Czechs?
licensed to kill time
This is from the BBC:
On CNN Int’l today some expert was speculating about future security checkpoints being on the roads before you get to the airport. Good times.
Gin & Tonic
Recent bombings in the subway there were “black widows”, but all the reports I’ve read of this one so far are that it was a man.
General Stuck
@stuckinred:
Yes, I remember that one well, and watched it play out on CNN/ the Russians tried out a new kind of gas to immobilize the bombers before they could detonate their bombs, and used too much or something, that ended up killing about everyone including the bombers. Big fuckup and Putin was on teevee begging for forgiveness/
Jack Bauer
@stuckinred: Back in 2002. It was the Russians using the gas.
Gin & Tonic
@stuckinred: You’re thinking of this.
BGinCHI
Any idea if Sarah Palin is reporting from her house on this?
suzanne
According to CNN, airport officials are re-routing arriving passengers through a different section of the airport, and there have been no departure delays. That’s pretty hardcore. A completely different attitude than if this had happened at, say JFK.
Svensker
Blogging about how you know nothing about it and have no opinion about it? It’s like a Seinfeld episode, only with less to look at.
JGabriel
Depends on what you think of the IRA or the ETA. Like the Basques, the Chechens are a cohesive ethnic group speaking a very old language from a small, very divergent, language family.
Mostly, they’re not so good. They may have a point about independence for themselves, but even when they get autonomy, they have a bad habit of continuing their attacks.
It’s an ugly situation, it’s been going on for at least a few centuries, and neither side can really be called the good guys.
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Dave
@suzanne: Russians are tough as nails. They’ve proven that over and over and over again.
Gin & Tonic
@General Stuck: Not “about everyone” — there were nearly 900 hostages, and (approximately) fewer than 200 total casualties. Not good, but not a majority.
Poopyman
FWIW, the updates in the link @Violet: points to has this:
So it looks unlikely to be a widow, although early eyewitness accounts are not exactly reliable.
geg6
@Culture of Truth:
You do realize, don’t you, that there is still an ongoing debate among historians as to whether John Brown was good or bad, with the good side (based on what I’ve read on the latest research) seeming, lately, to have the best evidence?
Of course, if you are a Southerner, that may not matter to you.
Jack Bauer
@Culture of Truth:
Honestly I think it’s impossible to know. I want to say they’re justified but then I think about the sort of country they’d create and the methods they use. I can’t call it. That said Russia should let them secede, as I believe that self rule is a right.
JGabriel
@Punchy:
No. There’s no relationship between the two groups. Chechens are not Slavic, or even Indo-European.
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Sly
Though this may be a technicality for some, the bomber does not necessarily have to be Chechen. Russia has tons of problems in the Caucasus that are not limited to Chechnya, and has been hit by suicide bombers from other areas.
Its also important to stress over and over and over that the conflict in the Caucasus has everything to do with ethnicity and ethnic nationalism and very little to do with religion. To the extent that religious rhetoric informs the conflict is explained by the extent that ethnicity informs Islamic belief in the Caucusus (which it does quite a bit).
Bob Loblaw
@suzanne:
Yes, the Russian people are pretty hardcore.
That’s why it was to the great relief to all the people of Europe and Asia that Russians can’t govern themselves for shit, or they’d have taken over the entire continent centuries ago. It’s the Russian way to be perpetually stoic in the face of their ongoing catastrophic self-destruction.
jp7505a
Explain to me again how the GOP plan to reduce the FBI budget by 42% over the next 10 years, is a GOOD idea? Maybe they think Osama will lay-off 42% of his underwear bombers as a gesture of the bi-partisanship belief in small government!!!!!!!
stuckinred
Uh, let’s not forget “Islam is the traditional Religion in Chechnya. 94 % of the Chechens are Sunni Muslim”
General Stuck
@Gin & Tonic:
That’s true, I was commenting from memory, but the hostage takers released a couple hundred beforehand mostly children and old folks I think. But you are correct, not everyone.
Culture of Truth
@geg6: Yes, well I was trying to make a subtle point about good and bad rebels
Mr. Poppinfresh
Never underestimate the ability of a man like Putin to stage an attack like this as part of his forthcoming campaign to return to the presidency.
Total speculation on my part (and I would happily admit it falls on the wrong side of Occam’s razor), but remember: he has the motive.
Brachiator
@Comrade Javamanphil:
The bombers have political motives. Do you propose giving in unilaterally to their political demands?
On the other hand, the Tamils used to be a potent force in Sri Lanka. Ultimately, the government crushed them. It was brutal. No one in the international community raised much of a finger in protest or suggested a less brutal alternative. Not even DFHs.
And note that I am making no judgement on the validity of either the Chechen or Tamil political aims.
JGabriel
Jack Bauer:
Russia did let them secede for a little while in the 90’s. It was a failure. The former rebel that was in charge couldn’t keep the other rebel leaders in line, and they attacked in Ingushetia and Dagestan, if I remember correctly.
I’m generally in favor of self-rule for cohesive groups of ethno-linguistic aboriginal minorities, but the Chechen rebels have not been doing their cause any favors.
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Gin & Tonic
@Bob Loblaw:
That, and plenty of vodka.
Batocchio
John, to be fair about spelling “Chechen,” you’re talking about transliterating from a foreign language, Russian, using a different alphabet, Cyrillic. According to Wikipedia, it’s a Russian word probably based on a Persian or Arabic coinage, while “At various times in their history, Chechens used Georgian, Arabic and Latin alphabets; as of 2008, the official one is now the Cyrillic alphabet.” All I’m saying is don’t beat yourself up over it. “Chechen” may be considered standard, and thus preferable. However, it’s not uncommon for words from Russian, Chinese, Greek, Arabic, etc. to be transliterated differently.
fasteddie9318
@jp7505a:
Because the federal government CAN’T EVER POSSIBLY DO ANYTHING RIGHT EVER, WITHOUT EXCEPTION, FUCKING UP LEFT AND RIGHT, WE PRAY IN JESUS’ NAME, AMEN. So, I mean, the FBI budget is irrelevant, because they couldn’t possibly ever stop any terrorist attack anyway. Granted, they did stop literally tens of millions of super secret planned attacks during the Bush Administration that were so super secret that nobody knows anything about them, but that is merely central to my original point that they’re all bumbling fools who can’t stop a damned thing.
Dave
@Mr. Poppinfresh: It’s not unheard of (there were persistent rumors that the FSB orchestrated bombings along the Russia-Chechnya border to kick off the Second Chechnya War). But Putin has such a lock on the government he wouldn’t need to create an event to win.
Dave
@JGabriel: That’s exactly what happened. Another rebel group splintered off and got involved in helping rebels attack government interests in Dagestan.
Mr. Poppinfresh
@Dave: Probably not, but Medvedev has shown signs of a reluctance to simply step aside. Who knows how Putin and his inner circle view his strength and his ability to pull off a shuffle-coup under present circumstances; they could well have decided to strengthen his hand with something like this.
Again, pure stupid speculation, it was probably the Chechens… but people should remember that you’re dealing with a government who would LOVE to sell you a bill of sale a la Lindsey England or Pat Tillman, and are even more willing to manufacture such an incident in the first place. If they don’t lie about everything, they’ll DEFINITELY lie about SOMETHING.
Origuy
@stuckinred: I think that Sly’s point is that they are separatists because they are Chechens, not because they are Muslims. If they were Christians, they’d still hate the Russians.
KGO radio person was interviewing somebody from SFO airport security this morning. She was asking if they were taking any precautions or if any flights were affected. The guy sounded like he was trying not to say “Of course not you idiot, this happened in Russia.” There are no non-stop flights from SFO to Domodedovo, by the way.
stuckinred
@Origuy: k
JGabriel
@Origuy:
Yes. Ingushetia and Dagestan — Chechnya’s neighboring provinces to the west and east, respectively — are each mostly Muslim as well and speak languages related to Chechen, but they have a degree of autonomy, and are largely not engaged in separatist actions, with the caveat that some terrorist actions have originated from Dagestan in the last decade.
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Silver
It’s bad guys vs. bad guys here. It’s a shame they can’t both lose without blowing shit up, but they can’t.
Dave
@Mr. Poppinfresh: Fair point. But I don’t think Medvedev has the power base to pull it off. I wish he did…I’d rather work with him than Putin. But you are right in that the Russian government is suspect enough that doing something like this wouldn’t be a shock.
Brachiator
@Jack Bauer:
How about Cyprus? Or Northern Ireland? Or the Basques? Even though Basque separatists operate mainly in Spain, ancient Basque territory overlaps Spain and France. The Basques, who may be derived from people not the same as the homo sapiens who later migrated into Europe, have a claim that has been complicated by history.
And if you cede the land to the Basques, what do you do about the Catalan people, whose claims could overlap some Basque territory? How about the people of Quebec? Wouldn’t any claim they have to be independent be superseded by the claims of any aboriginal peoples?
How about the United States?
JGabriel
@Brachiator:
The Chechens ARE aboriginal to the Caucasus. They’ve been there about as long as the Basques have been in Europe.
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Paris
According to this, shit blows up fairly routinely in the provinces. Unsurprisingly, it gets much more attention in Moscow especially when the number of casualties are much higher.
fasteddie9318
@Brachiator:
Seriously? Not the same as homo sapiens? I knew they were linguistically unrelated to Indo-Europeans, but I’ve never heard this before. That’s really wild.
Jack Bauer
@JGabriel:
Yes, it’s true they fought to help Dagestan gain it’s own independence from Russia. But the waters get so muddy at this point it’s nearly impossible to know exactly what went on, what with the Russian Secret Service and all…
Do you recall Litvinenko?
jp7505a
Explain to me again how the GOP plan to reduce the FBI budget by 42% over the next 10 years, is a GOOD idea?
Because the federal government CAN’T EVER POSSIBLY DO ANYTHING RIGHT EVER, WITHOUT EXCEPTION, FUCKING UP LEFT AND RIGHT, WE PRAY IN JESUS’ NAME, AMEN. So, I mean, the FBI budget is irrelevant, because they couldn’t possibly ever stop any terrorist attack anyway. Granted, they did stop literally tens of millions of super secret planned attacks during the Bush Administration that were so super secret that nobody knows anything about them, but that is merely central to my original point that they’re all bumbling fools who can’t stop a damned thing.
Reply: ah ha. i knew i was missing something there
Ruckus
@Comrade Javamanphil:
Welcome to the un-serious corner.
Every time someone suggests that we cure the illness instead of treating the symptom they are considered to be left handed, stupid stepchild no one should listen to. Maybe we are just wrong.
JGabriel
@fasteddie9318:
No, not seriously. The Basques are homo sapiens; they’re just not Indo-European.
I think Brachiator is referring to the possibility that early Europeans may have mixed with Neaderthals, but that would have been about 30-40k years ago, whereas the Basques and Indo-Europeans wouldn’t have emerged as distinct cultures until after the last glacial maximum, about 12k years ago.
Both the Basques and IE people are likely to be descended from whatever sapiens mixed with Neanderthals, so — if that’s what he was talking about — it wouldn’t necessarily make the Basques a different branch of sapiens from Indo-Europeans.
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Jack Bauer
@Brachiator:
Fair points. My shorthand answer is this. When the occupying regime (imposed rule, empire) ends, it is fair and reasonable for self identified groups of culturally similar people to seek independent rule.
So when the Soviet Union ended, so should their rule over Chechnya, and it did for a while. Perhaps the same should have happen to NI after WW2, or Basque after Franco etc. But I agree you can’t keep going back into history forever.
Of course I think in the case of NI and the Basque Region democratic reform should have been perused as a priority and that I find their terroristic actions disgusting. What’s interesting to me is when a group like this operates against a perceived ‘bad guy’ we all get a little mushy.
Brachiator
@JGabriel: RE: Wouldn’t any claim they have to be independent be superseded by the claims of any aboriginal peoples?
My comment here was about Quebec separatists making claims that ignored those equal claims that could be made by North American aboriginal peoples.
@fasteddie9318:
Ah, no. I said the Basques “may be derived from people not the same as the homo sapiens who later migrated into Europe.” I did NOT say that the Basques were not representatives of homo sapiens.
There is all kinds of stuff popping up concerning the genetic diversity of early Europeans, but it is largely big time speculation. Here’s a taste:
But my main point was that Basque claims to the region are older than the European history which established the borders of Spain, France and Portugal.
Mike in NC
Nobody should wake John McCain from his midday nap or else he’ll go on TV and claim “We’re all Chechens now”.
scav
If I remember correctly, the Basque area has been weird since the Neanderthals. Almost makes one believe they’re always had different drummers in those mountains.
JGabriel
@Brachiator (quoting Sci-Tech Archive):
Or, more likely in my opinion, the Guanches (and Berbers) were a back migration into Africa from the Iberian glacial refuge, where they may have shared a common ancestor with the Basques and Saame (Lapps). The Guanches were very light-skinned or white, suggesting selection for synthesizing Vitamin D from sunlight in higher latitudes.
But yeah, it’s messy. Looks like we share an interest in human migration patterns though.
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Brachiator
@JGabriel:
Skin color may tell less than conventional wisdom suggests. For example, there are Portuguese people of African descent who are light skinned. Their ancestors mixed with Africans in the days of the slave trade. The key indicator is the retention of the West African sickle cell gene (some parts of Portugal had problems with malaria, and those Portuguese who married or mated with Africans won their own version of the genetic lottery). We don’t know much about the swirl of inter-reactions between various migrating groups at various times in human history. Some of the old ways of looking at groups, real and imagined linguistic similarities, don’t hold up when compared to biological indices, and the determination and interpretation of biological indices are still in their infancy.
Yep. I took a couple of courses in human evolution my senior year in college to round out needed requirements, found I greatly enjoyed the subject, and have been trying to follow major trends ever since.